A nice thorough strategy guide can be found here:
http://db.gamefaqs.com/computer/doswin/file/homm_v_necro.txt
I've read it and it was very helpful. It contains information about hero skills, specialities, town buildup, battle strategies and army mixing.

What it lacks though is info about chaining troops. I know it was a popular strategy in heroes 3 but could never pull it out properly

From experience the most important choices(at least for me) are:
Dark magic->master of mind-curses->spirit link
The guy is a necromancer so dark magic is a natural choice.I love mass curse,slow and spirit link makes up for the few spell points.Can live without corrupted soil.You could substitute master of mind with master of pain if you like.
Summoning magic->master of life-comjuration->haunted mines(?)
Cursing is good but if you feel like rushing and facing bigger armies than yours you might as well make a few summons.Phantom forces on your skellies is a killer and summons(esp phoenix) are always welcome.Haunted mines isn't as useful since you will almost always have more troops than you need.
Attack->battle frenzy-archery->cold steel(?)
Skellies get base damage from 1-2 to 2-3 and you tend to have many of them.Archery empowers them even more(+20% ranged) and cold steel offers about +10% damage(not tested it).Nice touch.
Logistics->pathfinding->deathmarch(?)->silent stalker(?)
I'm not really into its abilities,base skill is enough for me.Deathmarch
has its usefulness decreased since the enemy will have to come to you(you will usually have amazing ranged power) and with silent stalker you will get a +12 scouting radious(nice!But you may not really need it) and I doubt the pc won't be fooled by your 'disguise'(not that it would matter).

These should do the trick though,you might also want to take sorcery->magic insight for phantom forces instead of summoning magic or instead of logistics/attack consider the following skills:
Enlightenment->scholar-inelligence->lord of undead for a boost in attributes,necromancy,spellpoints and learning spells from hired heroes.
Luck->dead man's curse for being extremely damaging(plase don't!) and occasionally halving your opponents'damage.
One more thingo not get banshee howl,you will never need it with Markal.
____________
Elvin you're a snowing Krogan.
-Adrius

Thought that info is outdated since 2.1/1.5 came out. Spirit link is now called mark of the necromancer and it has taken raise skeleton archer ability's place. Now you can just pursue the three masteries.
Due to motn being more accessible summoning is of more importance.
And will the new necromancy you cannot amass as many skellies so battle frenzy from attack is not that crucial even if attack is good.
Enlightenment still helps a lot with stats and intelligence for mana.

What you'll get is up to your preference and opponents but that's how things are more or less with the new changes.
____________
Elvin you're a snowing Krogan.
-Adrius

i started testing/playing with Necropolis today, ive always fancied Death theme.

but few things really bother me with this faction.

how do Necropolis players work around the lack of speed? i don't mean initiative right now, but speed. only two units in the army have 7 speed and without tactics, 7 isn't even enough to be able to hit on first round during battle. are Necro troops suppose to take a hit first? hard to believe with the amounts of HP they have...
tips, suggestions, anything? and i wouldn't call their initiative that great either :/ but atleast you could work around that with power of speed skill.

also any tips on how to work around those insane mercury costs? after getting magic guilds,zombies,spectres,wraiths and liches, your suppose to get 45 mercury overall for the damn spectral dragons. tho with the fact that Spectrals barely do more damage than Wraiths and their special is nothing to cheer about, they don't even seem to be worth it. resourcefulness isn't option either with the 2% chance at getting luck.

how about skill builds? Dark,Summoning and Attack sounds good but what about the fourth skill? Defense?

Deathy
u cant build spectral dragons on normal maps most of the time, the mercury and ore costs are extremely high for this building
i never build vampires also, because of high ore costs
and u are right, necro army cant kill their opponents in first turns, thats why they have good defense to withstand the dmg
u lose many of them in the begining of final battle, but u have frenzy, blind, puppet master... a lot of spells, to lock opponents army and to get time to raise ur dead
the biggest problem necro has, is dungeon and is weak generally against destruction magic users(armageddonist wizard and runemage)
but summoning magic can solve this problem
with help of phoenix and illusions u can greatly increase ur army dmg and what really helpfull is, is arcane armor, to reduce magical(physical too) dmg by 50%

Even if they had high speed they'd never get the first blow due to mediocre initiative. As a compensation they will have boosted numbers due to necromancy and the early raise dead that cuts down on the casulaties - besides with 30 power you can raise them back in a flash. And because dark cannot always be countered you can seriously weaken enemies which is why your units are not fast enough.

I don't even build bone dragons they are not needed. I build up to wights(skipping ghosts until then if I don't have mercury) then I get mage guild 5. Upgrades I get skeleton archers on day 1 if possible and maybe vampire lords on day 1 week 2 if I can afford it. They really help vs master hunters and fast frail neutrals as cerberi.

About skills I get dark, summoning and enlightenment to get intelligence and boost my spellpower/defense. As a 4th I may get luck, logistics, defense but attack is not as needed anymore unless you plan to get mass haste.
____________
Elvin you're a snowing Krogan.
-Adrius

yeah, i was kinda planning for getting Mass Haste, i thought it would help alot since ill be sure to have Mass Slow anyway. that way i could even up the initiative difference little bit, with the fastest Necro units only having 11. also the extra 15% you get from expert attack isn't too bad, along with battle frenzy for zombies and skeleton archers.

and i totally forgot Enlightment, silly me thanks for reminder, Intelligence is a must after all.

it doesn't really encourage the Necropolis players to think any better of their lvl 7s tho when everyone says how they can play without them haha. i guess ill wait with the dragons till TotE reduces the resource costs.

Build guild lvl4 ASAP and if you got elementals you'll have no mana problems(MotN). Frezny/blind at lvl4 is great too.
I still find raising skeletons best. Focus on rasing them, other low tier(=not dark energy overpriced) troops and don't wait too long before attacking. Attack is very good because battle frenzy gives a very nice overall damage boost and power of speed is always great.
Still, a typical necromancer has summoning, dark, enlightenment, sorcery and tries to win the game mainly by spells(puppet, phoenix). Maybe, sorcery may be dropped for attack just to make sure that mass slow won't be a threat. Alternatively, luck->magic resistance is not too bad. It's not so great vs mass slow but getting more lucky strikes can't be really that wrong..
Don't worry too much about the troops. They are not the main reason why necromancers win games. Phoenix is probably stronger than your whole army combined togerther.. not to mention all that puppeting, frenzing and blinding.
____________

I'm going to expand a bit on what sdfx said. Please keep in mind that I don' really have experience playing H5 in multiplayer against other humans, so I could be talking out my rear here.

I'm always figuring 2 things when I choose my strategy -how fast are the armies involved and what is my hero going to bring to the table.

Both Necro and Fortress are defensive oriented... they don't have troops with high speed and initiative, and precious little ways to mitigate that via artifacts and/or hero skills.

So I choose which hero to develop and skills to go for on Necros based on the assumption that I'm going to have to take the other guy's best shot before I can do much with my army.

I prefer Lucretia as my necro hero... her starting skills are good and she enhances vampires, one of your main fighting units.

As for which skills to get I follow along with sdfx... summoning, dark, enlightenment, sorcery and I try to go for defense as well. (If you're going to have to absorb damage, you might as well do it better.)

I love Kaspar. His aid tent is really something fantastic. High initiative and power..with plague tent u can kill shooters/casters usually before they can move..and tent brings your loses to a minimum..
____________

Quote:I love Kaspar. His aid tent is really something fantastic. High initiative and power..with plague tent u can kill shooters/casters usually before they can move..and tent brings your loses to a minimum..

Kaspar is a quite good hero at early game because his tent gives him nice creeping potential. But tent has only three shots what makes it sad in later. Sure he wont lose any troops in early because of tent+mark of thr necromancer+eternal servitute.
About the skills:
Lord of the Undead is it really worth to get if only noticed boost is 1 knowledge?
Chilling bones: about 5% melee damage return is simply to low. Making it to 10% or even 15% then it would be a worthy perk.
Leadership: If orcs are gonna get shatter magic instead any of magic why cant necros learn something else than leadership. Or it could reduces enemy morale by 1, 2, 3 depending level.

I'd say that the only reason for having leadership is the Herald of Death + Diplomacy combo. Unfortunately, using 6 level slots solely for a chance to see things like "169 Nightmares would like to join you... they will be converted to Archliches" I don't think is a good trade off for having so much of your character skills serving no purpose in the battle itself.

Since it is already practically a must to have a squire hero following around your main necromancer hero to take spare converted undead off to make room for more, you are only getting a slightly increased chance for neutrals to join you, saving the cash cost for upgrades and saving time for your squire shuttling back and forth to a necropolis to do the conversions and upgrades.

You're losing too much skill slots for this unless you're playing on a large map IMO and have plenty of time for creature strength to build up, and when you'll have a lot more skill points available.

Quote:Leadership: If orcs are gonna get shatter magic instead any of magic why cant necros learn something else than leadership. Or it could reduces enemy morale by 1, 2, 3 depending level.

He he ... I have actually had this discussion with Elvin, so I'm not surprised he's against the idea. Myself, I think it would be completely natural - yes, it would be quite powerful, but given the fact that you have to invest a rather precious skill slot to obtain it - and use three levels up to reach max - combined with the fact that native morale for armies are +2, I don't think it would be unreasonable. Of course, combined with the Banshee Howl and Sorrow, it starts to accumulate and might be very potent - but hey, Haven or Sylvan with Mass Haste and Leadership to obtain +5 (or more!) Morale is pretty damn potent as well.
____________Heroes 7 - News overview | Heroes 7 - Discussion thread

Quote:Leadership: If orcs are gonna get shatter magic instead any of magic why cant necros learn something else than leadership. Or it could reduces enemy morale by 1, 2, 3 depending level.

He he ... I have actually had this discussion with Elvin, so I'm not surprised he's against the idea. Myself, I think it would be completely natural - yes, it would be quite powerful, but given the fact that you have to invest a rather precious skill slot to obtain it - and use three levels up to reach max - combined with the fact that native morale for armies are +2, I don't think it would be unreasonable. Of course, combined with the Banshee Howl and Sorrow, it starts to accumulate and might be very potent - but hey, Haven or Sylvan with Mass Haste and Leadership to obtain +5 (or more!) Morale is pretty damn potent as well.

One thing I'd like to know, which I have not really checked before, is whether positive morale modifiers 'shadow stack'... I know that the max possible to APPLY either way is +/- 5... but let's say that you have expert leadership, lion crown, the morale cape and shrine bonuses. Do those extra morale points stick around for purposes of offsetting morale penalties? Lets say that you have a necro cast Howl of Terror for the -6 morale effect. If you had, say, +7 'shadow' morale would you wind up being +1 morale or at -1?